(Bloomberg) — Poland plans to temporarily suspend asylum rights as part of a new policy aimed at minimizing undocumented migration, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said.
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Saturday’s announcement comes weeks after Germany expanded border controls with its neighbors, and after years of a migration crisis that Poland says has roiled the presidents of Russia and Belarus.
“Part of the strategy will be the temporary territorial suspension of the right to asylum, and I will call for this decision to be recognized in Europe,” Tusk said in Warsaw.
“We know very well how Lukashenko and Putin use it, by smugglers, people smugglers, human traffickers – how the right to asylum is used exactly in violation of the essence of the right to asylum.”
Tusk said he would tighten Poland’s borders against undocumented newcomers despite possible disapproval from the European Union. More details about his plan are expected next week.
“We will not respect and implement EU ideas if we are sure they are harmful to our security,” Tusk said, referring to the EU migration pact.
Poland’s reservations about the EU’s migration policy add to growing objections from other members of the bloc. In September, Hungary and the Netherlands asked for an exemption from the asylum treaty, while Denmark has called for tightening EU migration rules.
The pact, which was approved earlier this year after nearly a decade of turbulent negotiations, aimed to standardize the system used to process asylum applications and speed up procedures.
It also established a ‘solidarity mechanism’ that required member states for the first time to agree on admitting an annual quota of migrants, paying compensation for every asylum seeker they reject, or increasing support for EU broad arrivals handling operations. .
Earlier this week, Tusk, a former president of the European Council, called on the EU to do more to tackle undocumented migration as the country faces illegal border crossings on its eastern border with Belarus.
“Poland is in a special situation,” Tusk said Wednesday at a press conference in Prague with Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala. “That is why our position within the EU will be particularly difficult.”
Poland has tried several measures to restrict access across its eastern border, including building a wall guarded by soldiers and pledging to spend billions on additional fortifications. As a result, the number of irregular crossings to Poland has fallen significantly.
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